Chinese get culinary kick from edible bugs

April 24, 1998
Web posted at: 10:40 p.m. EDT (0240 GMT)

BEIJING (CNN) -- Scorpions were once a healthy snack for the Imperial court. Other bugs often provided a necessary protein supplement during the leaner days of the Cultural Revolution. Now, after a long absence, bugs are once again creeping onto the menus in Beijing restaurants.

Today, they are eaten more as a novelty. "Nowadays, the health of the Chinese is stronger than the foreigners'," says Li Zhen, an avid insect-eater.

Usually served deep-fried with an added dash of salt, the most commonly eaten insects include scorpions, cicadas, locusts, grasshoppers, bean worms, and silkworm chrysalides.

People eating bugs on the streets of Beijing
	2.2M/40 sec./320x240 QuickTime movie

Scorpions are the most popular choice for protein, since they are also believed to reduce the level of harmful toxins in the body. The taste has most often been compared to that of toast or fried chips.

"Some people want to try something new," says bug vendor Zhou Zen Fang, who says he can sell more than 100 sticks of cooked bugs -- most of the sticks bearing three or four of the juicy critters -- on a good day. "Others understand their value, and want to eat them to cool down the body. Others are just attracted by the idea."

Fancier restaurants across China also dish up an assortment of crawling creatures for diners with a more discerning eye and a larger wallet.

Now that food is relatively abundant in metropolitan areas of China, both in quantity and type, people have looked to old ideas and small insects to find culinary excitement.

"Traditionally, scorpions are part of the 'Five Dangers,'" Li says. "People were afraid of them. Now, people eat them. Isn't that also a kind of revolution?"

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